Rites of Repentance
by Malvolia
Summary: Out from beneath the threat of Downton's imminent financial collapse, Mary contemplates the specter of Lavinia, and at last truly understands the reason behind Matthew's long-standing objection to taking Reginald Swire's money. [Set after the events of episode 3x03.]


Mary stood at her window, one hand holding back the curtain so she could peer out across the grounds of Downton Abbey, drinking in the sight of familiar things that were no longer lost to her. Perhaps she should feel more downcast, considering Edith had probably sobbed herself to sleep by now over her disastrous wedding attempt, but Mary's heart was still leaping erratically. Matthew had been forced to believe Reginald Swire's assertion that his daughter Lavinia had forgiven him and wished him happy with Mary. Matthew had spoken to Papa and offered him the money to save Downton. Matthew had been made an equal partner in the estate. She had never loved her husband like she loved him today.

It occurred to her that perhaps now, finally, they were clear of Lavinia Swire. Though that wasn't fair. She knew it wasn't.

Lavinia's memory had been a fearsome specter to Matthew for years, from the moment she died with the knowledge that Matthew loved Mary more than he loved her. (It had never particularly bothered Mary, but then she had never been a candidate for canonization.) The other woman's ghost had twice stood between Mary and the loves of her life—Matthew and Downton—but Mary had never been able to hate Lavinia in person. Even though she had wanted to.

It would have been easier to move on past Matthew had he chosen a hideously ugly or atrociously indecorous woman, but instead Mary's rival-that-wasn't could have stepped straight from the pages of one of those prim-and-proper novels that sat gathering dust in the Downton Abbey library. This new fiancée understood Matthew's background, she was kind to everyone, she was loyal and unselfish and generous and all the things that Mary never was. All the things that someone like Matthew deserved.

Lavinia had been perfect. No matter how deeply Mary regretted putting Matthew off when she thought he might not be the heir to Downton, after all, she couldn't have brought herself to interfere with Lavinia's happiness, any more than she could have taken a stone from the churchyard and hurled it through one of the stained glass windows.

Mary found her mind wandering to her husband's expression when he had finally accepted the truth of Mr. Swire's words. As clearly as though it were happening again, she saw him lean into the armchair, the hand over his face not hiding the smile spreading across it; she heard the laugh that was almost a sigh.

At the sound of the door opening behind her, she turned from the window. Matthew smiled at her, and it was the same expression he had worn that afternoon. It was light and open and free, and it struck her that it hadn't really been any of those things, not fully, since Lavinia's death.

As clearly as though she had always seen it, Mary knew that in that one moment by the gramophone, she had been the stone Matthew had thrown carelessly, and Lavinia's happiness and very life had been lying in a million colorful pieces around his feet ever since. And in her constant harping on at him about using the money to save Downton, she had been grinding the shards to dust.

"I'm sorry," she said, no sooner than the thought.

His smile was replaced by bewilderment. "Whatever for?"

"For putting Downton over your sense of honor, just because I didn't see any reason for you to blame yourself. Maybe that's what comes of you ending up with a woman inured to scandal, instead of a saint." She waved off his objection before he could voice it. "I should have listened to you. _Really_ listened."

"Honor," he laughed, but the bitterness in his eyes that she had been used to seeing when the subject of his late fiancée arose was absent. "It was my lapsed sense of honor that made the whole mess. You didn't exactly throw yourself at me that night in the hall. In fact, knowing what I know now of your feelings at the time, I have often thought you conducted yourself admirably through my entire convalescence."

"I was glad that you loved me more than you loved her," said Mary. "I'm still glad of it. Exceedingly glad. I'm afraid I can't bring myself to care whether or not that is an admirable sentiment."

He reached for her hands. "Lavinia...Lavinia _was_ a saint. And she's offered me absolution."

Mary remembered with a pang all the times she had accused Matthew of not being on her side, and she hoped that the strength of her grip would convey the contrition she couldn't put into words. "Will you take it, my darling?"

He answered by taking her into his arms with greater confidence than he ever had before, and his relief landed on her tongue like a sacrament.


End file.
